As I write this article, we are at the halfway point for the year. As a sales and business development coach, I have recommended to clients for years that they take the halfway point of each year as an opportunity to reflect on where they've gone so far and where they would like to go. Many organizations only look at goal setting at the beginning or the end of each year. Contrary to that, I find it highly beneficial to evaluate progress, at minimum, at the halfway point of each year. Instead of waiting until the end of the year to course correct, the halfway point is a good time to look at objectives like sales results, the level of prospecting for new business that your company does, your staff and other processes.
For the purpose of this article, I'd like to focus on making the necessary improvements to your business based on how you view the next six months. With the current inflation rates, the interest rate hikes, supply chain issues and other challenges taking place around the world, it may be important to look at your business right now and make sure you're heading in the right direction. Whether you are a business owner, a supervisor or a salesperson, one can look at efforts and make sure they are pointing in the right direction. In order to do this, especially during a busy summer season, it takes discipline to find time. It can get extremely busy with projects and many are still dealing with the pent up demand that occurred during the pandemic.
One way to find time to work on your business is to simply block out time on your calendar. As example, right now I dedicate Friday afternoons from 1:00 to 3:30 to work on nothing but business planning. The list of items dedicated towards this time could be anything from marketing, website development, program development, networking group responsibilities, banking, office and building improvements, insurance improvements and the like.
It is easy to stay busy with all of the tasks that are in front of us including putting out fires. There are daily events that occur in any business and, obviously, those need to be taken care of in a timely fashion. However, often companies do not grow because they are not planning for the growth. If we don't take time to look at all aspects of our business on occasion, time can slip by and improvements may never be made. For larger companies, this might be an easier situation because they have levels of people to work on those tasks while the leadership plans for the growth of the company. But for smaller organizations where the owner is involved with the day-to-day activities of the company, it becomes more difficult.
Going back to the Friday afternoon sessions that I run for myself, I like to dedicate each Friday to a specific topic. As example, as I write this article on a Friday morning, my plan this afternoon is to only work on marketing. We will be discussing future videos for the blog, potential advertising in various written publications and a flyer for different events we have coming up. Although the timing of the conversation may be difficult because we are so busy this time of year, I find the consistency of these meetings to be critical. It is very important to establish habits around having meetings like this and making it a policy to have mandatory attendance. Additionally, I have a rule that in each one of these meetings decisions are made. It is never simply a discussion meeting. Rather, decisions are made on each item which really helps with the progress.
In these meetings, you can accomplish a lot in a very little amount of time if you are well prepared. Some of the things you can do to get the most out of these meetings are:
- Have rules set in place in advance about how the meetings are run. As an example, start on time, end on time and no one can be late.
- Assign aspects of each meeting to the individuals in your organization that will be participating. Ask them to bring research, have questions answered and present.
- Have rules about talk times and have a “time warden”. The responsibility of this individual is to make sure that no one gets off topic, talks too long or interrupts someone that is speaking.
- As said before, leave every meeting with action items and who is responsible for each. Assign a recorder that will take notes on every meeting, which will include deadlines and responsibilities for those involved. A copy either gets distributed or put into the cloud so all participants can view progress.
- Have a brainstorming session in the last five minutes of every meeting. This session will help set up the next discussion on the topic.
For some that are reading this article, they may say to themselves, “I'm already working on these sorts of things, and we work on them all the time”. For those organizations, it may be that there are ‘little forgotten’ things that need to be addressed instead. As example, looking at how much is being spent on fuel or doing research on wages or looking at alternatives for shipping items or even office supplies. Sometimes, the little things in businesses are forgotten and over time these little things can add up to create an issue or prevent companies from realizing their goals.
Taking time each week to work on the little things in your business can have a positive effect on your bottom line. With the uncertainty in the economy right now, take this opportunity to reevaluate aspects of your business. You might ask yourself, what can be improved? Where can I save money? Where can I save time? What investments can I make to help position myself in the next 3-6 months? What preparations can I make right now that will help me weather any storm that might be coming my way? Asking ourselves questions like these can help you finish the year strong and help you meet your goals well into the future.
Some potential items to evaluate:
Marketing & advertising Compensations Technology
Insurance Maintenance Communication
Product costs Accounting Customers
Service costs Website Routines
Vendors Policies Scheduling
Employee quantity & quality Office look Hiring
Vehicles Training Processes
Facilities Tools Strategy